Illusions
by sablize
Summary: Because illusions were easy, easier than actually being.  A character study of Atticus Finch.  No particular pairings.


**Disclaimer:** Don't own it, never did, never will.

**A/N:** YES I AM ALIVE. But finals have been a pain in my ass lately and I have neither the time nor the inspiration to write anything, except this, which I really just forced out for some English extra credit. I do love To Kill A Mockingbird, though, and Atticus Finch is a man after my heart. Well, anyways, here's my story. I'll update my other stuff soon, promise!

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><p>Illusions<p>

"_It tears him to pieces. He doesn't show it much, but it tears him to pieces."_

_-Aunt Alexandra_

—

Atticus Finch was never a strong man—physically or mentally—but he gave the illusion. Because illusions were easy, easier than actually _being_. And since the people of Maycomb took nearly everything at face value, well, it became even easier. So Atticus fell into the routine of maintaining this illusion and after a while it became more of a habit than anything.

It all started, really, when his wife died.

It was like someone had punched a hole straight through his chest. He just didn't know what to _do_ and he was fumbling for solid ground (but it was gone, it was all gone). There was nothing he could have done to save her, and yet he felt so useless. But he had to be strong, he had to be strong for his (motherless) children. So he constructed his wall, his shell, his illusion, even though he was crumbling from the inside out.

Telling his children was perhaps the hardest part, though Scout, then, was too young to understand and Jem barely old enough. But he kept strong—or the illusion of it—for them.

He came to hate the sympathy. He hated the food that arrived by the basket-load, the endless whispers that followed him around town, the anxious calls from his family and everyone in Maycomb county, and then some. He didn't _want_ their sympathy, he wanted _advice_. He didn't need their pity. He had two children to raise, alone, and he didn't have time for pity. He wanted to know. He wanted to know how to carry on and how to raise his children properly, because he was so lost and he didn't even know where to start.

After a while, he stopped wanting. He ducked behind his wall and he tried his hardest, and that had to be enough.

—

To be truthful, he'd seen the storm coming for a while now.

It was slow-building, lingering on the horizon while Atticus honed his lawyer skills and maintained his illusion and attempted to raise his children properly. Then the day came when he was assigned Tom Robinson's case, and he knew the storm had arrived.

It didn't worry him terribly. He could get them both by without much trouble, he thought (hoped). He was worried only for Scout and Jem, so young and ignorant, both of them spoiling for a fight. But he would get all of them through it, he swore to himself. They would come out strong, because that's what Atticus Finch was: strong. So he held his illusion and his walls, and he prepared his case. He would get them through it. He _promised_.

—

Alexandra's quiet disapproval aggravated him in a way he couldn't quite understand. She was his sister, his family, and of course he respected her opinion. Even when her opinion was blatant insults on Scout's lack of lady-like qualities or Calpurnia's presence or just the way he'd raised his children in general.

_I tried_, he wanted to tell her. _I'm sorry it seems that I didn't try hard enough but you weren't exactly there to lend a hand, either, and I'd appreciate it if you'd keep your thoughts on my children to yourself, thank you_. They were all he had; Alexandra couldn't take away from that.

—

He was numb and his shell was just now starting to chip away—though, honestly, he wondered what had taken it so long.

_There's always the appeal_, he thought as he left the courthouse that day. But he wasn't even upset about losing the case; no, he was disappointed. He was just so _disappointed_ in these people, who condemned an innocent man just because of a prejudice. It sickened him to the core.

He just didn't know what to do with Maycomb.

He kept his head high anyways.

—

When he woke up the next morning and saw the food… oh, the _food_. He knew it was for thanks (and not out of pity) but times were hard, and they didn't have to do all that, and—

Really, though, it's his wife's death all over again.

Looking at the goods piled high in the kitchen, he struggled to hold his tears (of sadness? Of gratitude? He wasn't sure, he didn't want to know), he struggled to keep the illusion, but _crack crack_ went another fracture in his shell.

And then Bob Ewell found him and, really, it was nothing less than he expected: the cursing, the spit to the face, and the grand finale—

"Too proud to fight, you—"

His reply took no illusion, because Atticus wasn't really angry or upset; all it took was a healthy dose of wit: "No, too old." Then he was walking, and Bob Ewell was behind him, and he went on with his day as usual. The thing that bothered him was his family's worry, where he wasn't worried at all.

(On second thought… maybe he _was_ becoming strong. Maybe… maybe, the illusion was becoming the man, and the man the illusion. Maybe)

—

His shell nearly broke when he heard the news.

He'd _failed_, though didn't he always? He failed as a parent, he failed as a brother, and now he failed as a lawyer. He'd promised himself. _He'd_. _Promised_. And now, now he had failed himself.

Giving the news to Mrs. Robinson was one of the hardest things he'd ever done.

Guess the illusion wasn't becoming the man, after all.

—

He should have tried harder… oh, he should have _believed_ him, he should have believed Bob Ewell. And he knew he made a point of not hating people but if there was one man he hated most in the world at that moment, as his son lay unconscious and his daughter struggled out of the ham costume that had saved her life, it was Bob Ewell.

Later, though, sitting there with Jem's book as he slept and as Scout slept against him… something in him felt calm. The worst was over. It was all over. And they had paid a terrible price (though not as terrible as it could have been, he supposed) but they were alright, they were _okay_. There, then, that was all that mattered. Maybe he was a failure as a parent and a brother and a lawyer, but at that moment, Atticus Finch didn't really mind.

So he kept the illusion; it was a part of him, just as his failures were a part of him. He would be strong for his family, especially his children. He would always be there. He would be their rock. He would be, _could_ be strong for them.

Scout sighed against him, and he stroked her hair and kept on reading.

The storm had passed. All was well.


End file.
